Get Lucky
by Suilven
Summary: This day couldn't possibly get any worse, or so Scully thought. Several times over. But, maybe, when things go badly enough, they end up just right after all.


This day couldn't possibly get any worse.

That was what she had thought approximately three _this day couldn't possibly get any worse_ s ago, at any rate. Now, with icy cold bog water seeping into the two layers of clothing separating her nether regions from the bacteria-laden slop they were wading through, she was beginning to reconsider her previous assessment.

It hadn't gone well, right from the moment she'd sleepily staggered out of bed and smashed her baby toe into the bottom corner of her dresser. It was Saturday, so she hadn't expected to be woken up by an excited Mulder, babbling something about 'swamp' and 'only happens once every ten years' and 'I'll be there to pick you up in an hour.'

The coffee they'd picked up on their way out of D.C. was tepid at best, which was just as well, as she'd spilled it all over her lap less than five minutes later. She'd managed to soak up the worst of it with handful of crumpled napkins, and Mulder had found a rest stop where she could change into the pair of jeans from her overnight bag, but she was now coffee-less and the fabric under her ass was damp.

Not an auspicious start.

Then, she'd flipped open the case file to read as he drove. "This place is called 'Dismal Swamp'? Are you serious?"

"It's also known as the Everglades of Central New Jersey." He had the nerve to smile at her, cracking a sunflower seed between his back teeth as he did so.

She was going to kill him.

Scully rubbed her hands over her face and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. "And _what_ exactly is supposed to happen there every ten years?"

"Local legends say that there's a water spirit that's lived there for generations, inhabiting the body of one of the marsh animals. But the animal can't sustain the spirit forever, so it has to seek out a new host every ten years on the night of the autumnal equinox. Rumour has it that witnessing the spirit swap bodies is supposed to bring good luck."

She bit her lip. Hard. Took another controlled breath. A water spirit. She stifled another murderous impulse.

"And how exactly are we supposed to be in the right place at the right time to see this happen? This is a huge area — of swamp, I might add — so I don't expect there are going to be a lot of hiking trails." Glaring at him suspiciously, she closed the folder, crossed her arms over her chest, and leaned back in her seat. There was no point in even looking at the rest of his notes. This was ridiculous. "How did you even get Skinner to agree to cover this?"

"Well…" He looked somewhat chagrined. "Skinner hasn't agreed." She opened her mouth to protest, but he barrelled on. "Yet. But he will."

"Uh huh."

"And, as for your other question, I think I've been able to narrow it down. If you look at the other map in the file, I've marked where the previous sightings have occurred."

Scully sighed and flipped the folder open once more.

"Ow! Dammit!" She held up her finger to see the blood welling up from the paper cut she had just given herself.

"You okay? Napkin?" He held out one that had somehow escaped the coffee apocalypse.

"I'm fine, Mulder." But she snatched it from his hand anyway and pressed it against the cut as she rifled through the pages to pull out the other map. A group of neatly drawn 'X's in blue pen adorned a central section. "This is a ten mile hike in. Maybe more."

"That's okay. We have plenty of time. We'll be in town by noon, so we can get a room, have some lunch, pick up any supplies we might need. It's supposed to happen under moonlight, so we don't need to rush."

She rolled her eyes. "What happens if it's cloudy? Does it skip a year?" The cut had stopped bleeding, so she balled up the napkin and shoved it in her pocket.

He ignored her, tapping his fingers along with the radio. "We should definitely get bug spray… unless you brought some?"

"I did not. So help me, Mulder, if this is another _nice trip to the forest_ , I'm going to—"

"No, no, no! Nothing like that. I swear!" He looked over at her with that stupid hang dog expression and she sighed in resignation.

"It'd better not be."

The motel he'd booked had turned out to be not so much a motel as a few shacks built in a row, each one leaning against the others in an attempt to keep them all from falling over like a row of dominoes. One of them served as the main office, and she'd walked a circuit of the pothole-ridden gravel parking lot while Mulder checked them in.

There was only one "suite" available.

Of course there was.

"I'm afraid to ask why," she'd gotten out through her gritted teeth.

"Well, they apparently got a notice that they need to fumigate the others for—"

"Forget it." She held up her hand. "Just… forget it. I don't want to know."

Lunch was a meatloaf sandwich of questionable origin, but the only other option had been egg salad with a suspicious greyish tinge to it, and she hoped to increase the odds of _not_ getting food poisoning before the day was out.

The lace on her hiking boot had snapped as she was tightening it.

The wooden boardwalk trail had ended two or three miles ago, so now they were slogging directly through the wet marsh, which had slowed their pace considerably. She was sure the swarm of mosquitoes hovering over them was appreciative.

At least this day couldn't possibly get any worse.

She needed to stop thinking that.

Also, she was _not_ doing this again. The next time Mulder called her on a Saturday morning, she was going to unplug the phone and go back to sleep. He could go look for water spirits on his own damn time, not hers.

He was walking just ahead of her, poking at the ground in front of them with a makeshift walking stick in one hand and the compass in the other. She had the map in her backpack, where it was hopefully still somewhat dry, unlike them.

"If you drop that compass, don't think I won't shoot you."

He grinned, wiping the sweat off his forehead and leaving a smear of dirt behind. "There should be an island of sorts up ahead, a big rocky patch, where we can stop and get our bearings."

Why did Mulder have to be so damn cute when he was excited about something? The biggest flaw in this whole equation was that she couldn't put up even token resistance when he got that boyish glint in his eye that simultaneously made her throw her own rationality out the window and made her panties wetter than the bog they were currently standing in.

She slapped a mosquito on her arm and flicked its mangled corpse away with practised precision. Another hundred or so vied to take its place. "Onward, ho."

The sun was dipping below the horizon when they reached the outcropping of large boulders and chunks of stone covering an area about two or three times the size of her apartment. It was overgrown with long prairie type grasses, perhaps from seeds carried on the wind a long time ago. Mulder scrambled up first, extending his hand to help her up.

"Let's take a breather and decide which route looks easiest." He plopped down in the grass and twisted his upper body from side to side, stretching out the muscles in his back and shoulders.

 _Uh, none of them?_ She managed to keep the thought to herself, but barely.

Shrugging off her backpack, Scully sat down next to him and pulled out bottles of water and granola bars, trying to ignore the unpleasant squelching of her wet socks inside her wet boots. She briefly wondered how many leeches she was going to find between her toes when this was all said and done, pondered how the flukeman was getting on these days, and then decided she didn't want to think about it anymore.

A chorus of frogs had started up as the brightness of the afternoon faded, drowning out the high pitched whine of the insect cloud that hadn't dispersed in the slightest.

"It's pretty, isn't it?" Mulder gestured at the setting sun with the gnawed end of his granola bar before shoving the rest of it into his mouth. "And it's mostly clear so far. Just a couple of clouds."

It seemed like there were a lot more colours to the sunset here than in the city. Various shades of oranges and pinks and yellows were blended together in broad strokes across the sky, and the reflection of it all in the water made it feel even bigger, more vibrant. A lone marsh bird trilled in the distance.

"Yeah, I guess it is." She took a long drink of water and handed him the bottle, then raised her knees up and wrapped her arms around them. It was rather lovely if you ignored the bugs and the mud and swampy stench of decaying plant matter. Leave it to Mulder to see the beauty in it.

They sat and listened to the amorous frogs sing, ate another granola bar each, and Scully hoped she wasn't going to need to go the bathroom any time soon. Sometimes, particularly in outdoor survival situations, having female anatomy was less than convenient.

"All right, let's see where we're headed." She unzipped the backpack and retrieved the map, which was damp around the creased edges but thankfully not a soggy, pulpy mess. Spreading it out over her knees, Mulder edged closer to peer at it over her shoulder.

"That's where we need to be." He jabbed the cluster of blue marks with his finger. "And here's where we are." Another poke.

"So, a few more miles roughly north east."

"Yep." He stood up and pulled out the compass, glancing at it before squinting in what she hoped was the right direction. "Might as well pull out the flashlights now, too. It's going to get dark quickly out here."

"I've heard that about being in the middle of nowhere." She carefully refolded the map and stowed it away along with their wrappers and empty water bottle before pulling out two flashlights that she hoped Mulder had checked were water resistant.

They resumed their march in silence. Scully was starting to feel tired and was regretting staying up late last night to watch the end of Romancing the Stone, which she'd happened to catch while flipping channels. She hadn't planned to be up early, and hiking through a swamp had not been on her 'to do' list for the day, strangely enough.

Another mile passed. And another. They switched on their flashlights, but only Mulder's worked. She sighed and debated about chucking hers into the water so she wouldn't have to carry it any more, but her guilty conscience about contaminating the pristine wetlands sadly outweighed her baser instincts. They were just going to have to stay close together then.

At least there weren't any alligators.

That they knew of.

She'd fallen into the rhythm of their squelching footsteps and was completely zoned out when Mulder stopped suddenly, and she collided into his back with a loud, "Oof!"

"Scully, look!" Mulder was pointing at globes of greenish light, flickering in the heavier foliage up ahead. "I think we're in the right place!"

"That's just swamp gas."

"Maybe, but maybe not. C'mon!" He took off at a fast lope towards them.

With a grumble, she headed after him, but with her shorter legs, he was quickly outpacing her. "Mulder!"

"Not too much further… You still behind me?"

"Barely – slow down!" She watched the bob of the flashlight beam as he stopped to wait for her.

"There's a gorgeous moon overhead." He grinned, his teeth unnaturally white in the glow of the flashlight. "I think we're going to get lucky tonight. I can feel it!"

At least someone was. At this rate, it wasn't _ever_ going to be her.

She'd almost reached him when her foot caught on a tangle of roots beneath the water, and she pitched face-first into the swamp with a muffled shriek as her mouth and nose unexpectedly filled with brackish water. Thankfully, Mulder hauled up her up almost immediately as she sputtered and coughed.

Worst. Day. Ever.

"You okay, Scully?" Mulder attempted to wipe the muck and water out of her eyes, but she batted his hands away to do it herself.

Her tongue tasted like she'd been gargling crickets. "I'm fine." She blinked a few times, deliberately ignoring both the stinging sensation and the knowledge of how many microbes her mucous membranes had likely now been exposed to. "I'm fine. Let's just… go. Find the thing, spirit. Whatever."

There was that hang dog look again. "Are you sure? We could go back and—"

"Mulder, we've _already_ hiked through the bloody swamp. We're not going back now. Come on." She snatched the flashlight from him and waved it towards the biggest cluster of lights dotting the surface of the water. "Let's go this way."

She turned and started walking, leaving him with no choice but to follow.

After a few minutes of sloshing, it seemed like they weren't getting any closer to the lights. They were flickering just as brightly and didn't appear to be moving, but they should have reached at least a few of them by now. If they were just pockets of methane, hydrogen sulfide, and carbon dioxide, they shouldn't be moving, should they? She swept the flashlight in a low arc over the water in front of them, but all was still.

"Scully!" Mulder's voice was a harsh, excited whisper. "Did you hear that?"

She stopped and listened.

Frogs. Bugs. The quiet lap of the water.

"I don't hear anything."

"It came from over there." He took the flashlight from her and pointed it off to the left, where there was a huge swath of tall reeds.

They stood still, waiting.

"There… is that…?" She touched his arm, speaking softly as a white-tailed deer stepped into view in the pale glow of the light.

It moved warily through the marsh grasses, its steps cautious as its ears flicked forward nervously. When it reached the open water, it stopped.

For a few minutes, nothing else happened. Scully caught herself holding her breath more than once.

Just when she was about to mouth the words, "Now what?", Mulder tugged on her sleeve and pointed up at the sky.

The shadow of an enormous long-necked bird was passing overhead, and the open eye of the moon blinked closed, casting the swamp into complete darkness except for the beam of the flashlight and the mysterious green lights. It was eerily quiet, and Scully noted that even the croaking of the frogs had gone silent.

A sudden breeze passed over them followed by a strange vibration in her bones, like the ruffle of feathers. The air around them felt oppressive, heavy hands pressing down on their shoulders to keep them in place. Like blowing out the candles on a birthday cake, the flickering green lights vanished.

Without warning, the deer reared, snorting wildly, and then crashed away madly in the direction opposite the way it had arrived just as the moon winked back into full brightness.

Scully found herself blinking as though waking from a deep sleep, looking around in confusion as the frogs began to serenade them once more.

"What just happened?" she whispered.

"I think the water spirit has a new body."

* * *

If she'd thought she was tired on the hike in, it barely held a candle to how exhausted she felt now. She was never going to be dry again. There was slime in her hair. She'd swallowed enough bugs for it to count as a protein serving, washed down with a few cups of bog water.

The first few miles had been fueled by the adrenaline of their experience — she still refused to admit that it had been anything more than an incredible wildlife sighting — but now her legs ached, she felt chilled right down into her bone marrow, and she desperately wanted a hot shower and a bed.

Scully almost cried when they reached the blissful solidity of the boardwalk trails, even though the batteries in the flashlight gave out shortly after and they had to walk the final two miles in the dark.

When they reached the car, she felt absolutely zero guilt about that future state of Mulder's upholstery, sighing in relief as she settled her wet, mud-covered body into the passenger side.

"Wanna check me for leeches?" He waggled his eyebrows at her as he put the key in the ignition.

"Motel. Now."

"So, that's a _yes_ then?"

"Mulder, if you don't start the car right now, I swear to God I will—"

"Okay, okay." He turned the key and there was a quiet clicking as the lights in the dash flickered briefly and then went dark.

Scully moaned. "You've got to be kidding me."

He tried again, with the same result. "I think the battery's dead."

Wasn't seeing the water spirit supposed to bring _good_ luck? With her head in her hands, she mumbled, "How far is it to the motel?"

"Seven… maybe eight miles? If you want to stay here, I could walk back, get a tow truck or find someone to give us a boost…?" He sounded contrite, but she wasn't about to let him off that easily.

"No. I'm wet and tired and cold." And, she really needed to pee, but she wasn't about to say that out loud. She squared her shoulders and opened the car door. "I am having a shower, dammit."

It was sheer force of will that propelled her forward, and she was sure even her blisters had blisters by the time they reached the squat, drunkenly leaning cabins of the motel.

"Which one are we in?" she asked wearily. She was showering first _and_ taking the bed. He could have the couch. Or the floor. Or the parking lot.

"Uh, number three. Let me get the key and we can…" He stuck his hand into his left pocket. "We can get all cleaned up, get some sleep…" He pulled out his hand and began fumbling in his right pocket. "And then we can go back for the car in the morning after…" He switched back to the left pocket. "You're not going to believe this, Scully, but I think I dropped the—"

At least she now knew of a convenient place to dump his body after she murdered him.

She took three deep cleansing breaths, just to be thorough, and then marched over to the main office and banged loudly on the door. It was probably too much to hope that there was someone there overnight, but it was worth a shot.

To her surprise, a gruff voice shouted, "Jus' a minute." Then there was some shuffling and banging, and the door swung open to reveal a grizzled old man with a ratty white beard and bright black eyes. The room behind him was dark and he hadn't bothered to turn on the lights. "What can I do fer ya? Yous need a suite? We're all booked at the moment." He looked at Scully, blinked, and blinked again.

"We actually already have one of your, uh, suites booked. Number three. My partner," Mulder gave a sheepish wave, "lost the key and we were hoping you had a spare."

"Hrmmm. There's an extra charge for that ya know."

"That's fine." Anything. Whatever. "Just add it to the bill."

He studied her with a squint and gave her another long blink, scratching at his beard with one gnarled hand. "All right. Jus' hang on one sec." The door creaked shut as he shuffled back inside.

Scully eased the backpack off her shoulders where it was stuck like a second skin and braced her hands on her lower back as she stretched.

"You can shower first, Scully," Mulder said, picking up the backpack and swinging it up over his shoulder. "I don't think I'm as muddy as you, since you're so much closer to the ground and—"

She stopped him with a death glare and he wisely closed his mouth.

The door swung open again and the man reappeared with a small box tucked under his arm. With the other, he held out a key, but pulled it back as Scully reached for it. "Don't be losing this one, now. Only got the one spare." He gave Mulder a disgruntled look.

"Don't worry. _I_ won't lose it." Scully held out her hand and the man reluctantly dropped the key into it.

"Also, just so yous know, there's no 'lectricity, so you'll be needin' these." He handed over a grubby box of candles and a book of matches while making a horrific wet cough that he didn't cover in the slightest. "Reckon the 'coons have chewed through the wiring again. Should be lots of wood stacked up by the fireplace though, so you'll be warm enough."

* * *

The cabin was… rustic. All the furnishings had seen better days and either it smelled like mould or her nostrils had been colonized by swamp fungi, but it had a bathroom and running water and a bed and that was all that mattered. She was shivering as they lit the candles, jamming them into the holders they found on the table by the door. Evidently, power loss, racoon-induced or otherwise, was a somewhat common occurrence.

Mulder tossed the sodden backpack beside the table and rubbed his hands together as he studied the fireplace. "I'll get the fire going while you shower."

She nodded. "Thanks. You might want to make sure that thing is vented properly, too." Nothing like a little carbon monoxide poisoning to round out the trip.

Grabbing one of the candles, Scully made her way to the bathroom. It was probably just as well there was no power, as she wasn't sure she wanted to clearly be able to see what was growing in between the tiles. She stripped off her dirty clothes with some difficulty as everything was plastered to her skin with layers of drying muck. Leaving it all in a muddy heap on the floor, she used the toilet — sheer bliss — and then stepped into the shower and turned on the water.

There was no hot water.

There was no warm water either.

But, she was covered in mud and bog and other unknown detritus so forgoing an exhaustive cleansing simply wasn't an option. Clenching her jaw, she unwrapped the square of soap, stepped under the freezing drizzle of the rusted out shower head and began to scrub.

There were no tiny complimentary bottles of shampoo, no surprise there, so she just used the bar of soap on her hair, too. It took forever to rinse the suds out, as the water pressure was akin to a slightly leaky faucet.

Her teeth were chattering and she was shivering violently by the time she shut the water off and wrapped the threadbare towel around her body. She hoped Mulder had been able to get the fire going or she was going have hypothermia next. At least she would be able to change into her pajamas, something warm and dry…

Her pajamas.

Her pajamas that were in her overnight bag.

Her overnight bag that was… "In the fucking car."

She looked sadly at the pile of sodden, filthy clothes on the floor. With muttered curses that would have made Ahab turn pink from the tips of his ears all the way to his toes, she turned the water back on in the shower, rinsed out all of her clothes, and hung them to dry — not that they likely would by morning — over the towel rack.

When she emerged from the bathroom, she was immediately struck by the warmth of the room, easily a few degrees warmer than the bathroom already. There was a crackling fire in the fireplace, and Mulder was warming himself in front of it.

Thank God for that.

Icy rivulets of water were trailing from her hair, as there had only been two towels, one for each of them, and she wasn't cruel enough to take them both.

"My turn to shower. You go warm up." He grinned at her, his face still smeared with blobs of dirt.

"Thanks, Mulder."

Once he was in the bathroom, she took the towel from her body and used it to vigorously rub her hair. Now, what was she going to do about the lack of clothes? She looked around the room, but the only obvious choice was the blankets on the bed. It would have to do. She pulled off the quilt and sat down in front of the fireplace, wrapping it carefully around her so that her body was completely concealed. It smelled musty, but it was dry, and that was worth a great deal at the moment.

From the bathroom, she heard the water turn on. A pause. And then a bellow of, "Jesus fucking Christ!" as he'd evidently stepped under the spray.

She snorted.

She could hear him banging around, clearly trying to wash himself as fast as humanly possible. When the water turned off and he emerged from the bathroom looking like a bedraggled hedgehog with a towel wrapped around his waist, that was it.

She lost it.

The whole day had just been one thing after another, and Mulder looked like a stray dog left out in the rain, and she was cold and covered in bug bites, and this whole place was probably about one rotten timber from coming down on top of them, and she began to laugh.

"Oh my God, Mulder. Can you believe…" She could barely get the words out she was laughing so hard, and the bewildered look on his face, like she'd finally gone off the deep end and there wasn't even any water in the pool, set her off even worse. Her sides ached, there were tears streaming down her face, and she could not stop laughing.

Evidently whatever she'd contracted was contagious, because he started to laugh, too.

"Worst day… ever…" She clutched at her sides and doubled over. Even her cheeks were starting to hurt. "Oh my God. Can't possibly… get any worse."

On the bright side, by the time her giggles subsided, she felt considerably less chilled. She patted the floor next to her after wiping the final tears from her eyes. "Come over by the fire, Mulder. It's nice."

He was eyeing her blanket enviously. "Is there room in there for two?"

"No. It's your fault we don't have any dry clothes. Get your own."

He made a frowny face at the sheet she'd left on the bed. "But you took the quilt."

"You're lucky I left you one at all."

With muttered grumbles he pulled the sheet off the bed and wrapped it around himself, shimmying awkwardly to pull off his wet towel from beneath it before plunking down next to her in front of the fire.

"There." She beamed at him. "Nice and warm."

"Hmph."

Sitting next to the fire felt heavenly. Her hair was slowly drying, she was clean, and the combined heat of Mulder sitting next to her and the glowing embers were starting to make her feel content and sleepy.

"Scully?" Mulder's voice made her start as she'd been starting to drowse off.

"Yeah?"

"Thanks for coming with me today." He turned to look at her, giving a slight shrug of his shoulders. "I know it probably wasn't how you wanted to spend your weekend."

"It wouldn't have been my first choice, no."

He glanced down, hiding the flicker of sadness in his eyes that she knew was there, and she continued on quickly, not wanting him to feel bad. "But someone's got to keep you out of trouble." She nudged him with her shoulder as her arms were still wrapped up inside the blanket. "I get to pick next weekend, deal?"

He looked back at her in surprise. "Next weekend?"

She nodded a little hesitantly. "If you want to, I mean."

"Yeah. Yes. Of course." He smiled broadly. "I figured you might want to kill me after today."

"The thought did cross my mind. More than once." She nudged him again with her shoulder.

He untucked his arms and combed his fingers through his hair before stretching his arms out behind him, hands braced on the floor, and leaned back. The sheet was still wrapped around his lower half, but his chest was bare, his tanned skin almost glowing in the light of the fire.

The man had no right to be that tempting. Just a smattering of chest hair. Finely defined abdominal muscles. She was staring. She knew she was but, dammit, he was _right there_ next to her, looking like _that_ , seemingly unaware of his own attractiveness, and didn't she deserve a little eye candy after the day she'd just had?

"Thanks for putting up with me."

She dragged her eyes back up to his face, but she could tell from the glint of amusement in his eyes that he'd noticed her gawking. Busted.

"See something you like, Agent Scully?"

"L-leech check. Standard protocol." She stuttered on the first word but managed a mock professional tone for the rest. _Totally not imaging licking my way up your abs, Agent Mulder._

"Hmmm. Seems like the protocol is missing a few steps though. It seems to me…" He paused to raise an eyebrow at her, mirroring the facial expression that she directed at him more often than not. "It seems to me that a standard leech check protocol should include an inspection of _all_ potentially affected body parts on _all_ potentially affected persons, don't you think? In your professional opinion. You are a medical doctor, after all."

"Nice try, Mulder."

He shrugged. "Suit yourself. In all fairness, I wasn't the one ogling _your_ chest."

She sputtered. "I was not… ogling."

"Call it what you like." A grin spread across his lips. "You were still staring."

"Like you don't look!"

His eyes were dark as he gave her a look that made her shiver. "Oh, I look. But I'm not so obvious about it."

She stared back at him, not sure what to say. Had they crossed the line from playful banter to something else? Did she want to parry back with a retort of her own? How far was she willing to let this go?

"Do you like what you see?"

Oh, God.

Had that just come out of her mouth, husky and teasing no less?

His eyes narrowed, and she felt like a specimen slide under a microscope. "Very much."

She swallowed the squeak that tried to escape from her throat. "I… uh… I think we should probably go to bed… I mean, to get some sleep. Not the, uh, other thing."

He had leaned in closer to her and the look in his eyes was making her flustered. Her gaze kept flicking back and forth between his eyes and his lips — would they be soft and firm under her own? Would he use his tongue to — No. She needed to get a grip, and fast, or she was going to kiss him and that wasn't allowed. She'd drawn that line in the sand a long time ago. No. Bad Scully.

She bit the corner of her lip, trying not to think about his.

"It's really late, and we have to go back for the car in the morning and drive back to D.C. and…" She was babbling. His face was close, so close, and she could feel her eyes wanting to close, her mouth wanting to make the crossing of those final few inches towards his.

Screw the line in the sand. After everything they'd been through together over the years, didn't they deserve a little happiness? Just one kiss… just one—

"Yep. You're right, as usual, Scully," he said matter of factly.

Her eyes snapped open.

He had pulled back, had begun to stand up.

Her jaw dropped open in shock. Where did he think he was going? He was supposed to be kissing her! Right now!

 _That's it._

With a feral sort of growl, she grabbed the sheet and tugged, simultaneously disrobing him and making him off balance so that he fell, almost on top of her.

"Whoa, Scully, I…"

She seized his face between her hands. "Mulder?"

He was breathing hard as he froze in place on his knees, his upper body pressed against hers. She could feel something hot and firm nudging her leg, and she sent a prayer up to God, and to that stupid water spirit for good measure, that it was what she thought it was. "Yes, Scully?"

"I changed my mind about doing what I want to do next weekend. I'd like to do it now."

"And… and what's that?"

"This."

She kissed him, long and fierce and hard, and the groan that rumbled up through his chest as he wrapped his arms around her made her tremble. His tongue was in her mouth giving it a more detailed inspection than her dental checkup last month and, goddamn, if it wasn't about time.

"Oh, Scully…" He was pushing her down to the floor and her fingers were tangled in his hair, wanting him closer. When he moved down her jaw to nip her earlobe, she pulled his hair so hard that he hissed.

She wanted him everywhere, all at once, but she was cocooned in the quilt. "Help me," she murmured in between swipes of her tongue along the salty skin of his neck. God, he tasted amazing. "Blanket. Off."

He hummed in agreement and began tugging at the edge of it, but he was as unwilling as she was to stop what he was doing — namely, leaving what was likely to be a very prominent hickey at the juncture between her neck and shoulder.

Reluctantly letting go of her grip on his hair, she began trying to extricate herself with a series of wiggles, but it didn't appear to be working. It didn't help that Mulder was now placing sloppy open-mouthed kisses along her collarbone, and her nipples were so hard that she thought they might just tear through the fabric that was trapping them and, thus, solve their current dilemma.

"Scully."

"Hmmm… what?" She was ready to give up, her head lolling back at the electric jolts of pleasure his mouth was sending arcing over her skin.

He stopped kissing her and lifted his head. "Do you smell something?"

She opened her eyes. Something did smell like… burning?

"The blanket! The blanket's on fire!" Scully yelped as she realized that they had inadvertently rolled a little too close to the fireplace.

Somehow, Mulder managed to free himself from the tangle of her arms and stood up quickly, shoving the balled up sheet over the edge that was smoldering. He stomped on it a few times as she tugged and shoved and squirmed her way out of the other end like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis.

She stood on shaky legs, the combination of arousal and adrenaline was a potent combination. "Is it out?"

Mulder lifted up the crumpled sheet, now slightly singed. "Looks like it."

"Thank God for that."

He dropped it and looked over at her. "Should we—" Then he froze, eyes widening.

"What now?" Her brow crinkled in confusion as she glanced behind her.

He shook his head mutely.

"Don't tell me… I'm about to be bitten by a snake or something, right?"

Mulder licked his lips slowly, not taking his eyes off her. "Scully… you're naked."

"Yes…"

"Holy shit, this is really happening."

She almost laughed at the look of boyish wonder on his face, but the sight of him, equally naked and stunning, with his cock jutting out proudly in front of him was enough to take her breath away.

"It is. If you want it to." She took a step towards him.

"I want it to."

Another step. "Me, too. I don't care if this fucking place falls down next. This is happening tonight. Right now."

"Jesus, yes."

She was in his arms and she let out a long, drawn out moan as his mouth found hers once more. His skin was hot against hers, and she felt like every nerve ending in her body was beating, throbbing to the same staccato pace as her heart.

"You feel so good…" He grabbed the globes of her ass with both hands, pulling her tight against him, and she ground herself against the glorious feeling of his hard erection pressing into the softness of her belly. She was unbelievably wet already, the inside of her thighs growing more and more slick.

"I can't wait to feel you inside me." She reached between them to grasp him in her hand, giving a slow exploratory stroke down his shaft as he groaned with pleasure. "I've imagined this so many times."

His breath was coming in short pants. "You have?"

She leaned in next to his ear and licked a painstakingly unhurried half circle around the top shell of his ear, enunciating each word carefully. "Every. Single. Night."

He groaned again, louder this time, before spinning them around and taking them the few steps needed so he could lay her down on the bed. "Fuck, the things you do to me. You have no idea."

And then one of her nipples was in his mouth and he was suckling it hard as his hand came up to knead and pull at her other breast.

"Mulder…. Oh my God…"

She was pulling his hair again but, if anything, it was urging him on as he continued his melodious symphony of pinches and licks and nips. Her legs were locked around his torso and she could feel the undulation of his hips against the side of the mattress, unconsciously craving the relief they both sought.

"I want to taste you," he mumbled into the roundness of her breast as his fingers slid down and through her folds for the first time. "Mmmm… so wet."

"Later." She hauled him up to her and devoured his mouth once more. "I want you inside me. Now." His cock was twitching against her inner thigh, deliciously close to where she needed him.

"I'm not… I'm not gonna last long." His tongue plundered her mouth as she squirmed, trying to angle her hips upward to get more friction. "Want this… fuck, do that again… want this to be good for you."

She reached down to guide him into the right spot. She needed him now, or she was going to be the X-Files' first fully verified case of spontaneous human combustion. "It will be. I'm close already. It's been so long…" Her clit was practically pulsing as the tip of him slid against her core. "Right there. Please. Right there." She clutched at his ass, her fingernails digging in with the force of her desire and he thrust into her in one firm stroke.

"Scully…" Her name was a sensual growl, rough and needy.

She was tingling all over from the shock of pleasure coursing through her. "More." Her head twisted from side to side on the mattress as she pushed her hips up to meet his. "Harder."

Mulder buried his head against her shoulder and began to thrust as her mind short-circuited. There was nothing but the push and pull of him inside her, the weight of him, the smell of their arousal. The room was filled with the wet slap of their bodies and the noises neither of them could contain. It was driving her closer and closer to the edge and it was almost exquisitely painful with how badly she needed this orgasm.

"God, make me come, Mulder…"

He slid a hand between them and as soon as his thumb brushed her clit she was coming. She might have screamed, she didn't know, didn't care. All that mattered were the spasms racking her body and the utter bliss singing through her veins.

It pushed Mulder over the brink, too, and he was shuddering and moaning her name over and over again. She'd never heard anything more beautiful.

They lay panting, scarcely able to move.

After a moment, he rolled off her onto his side so that his weight wouldn't crush her, but it was still a few minutes before either of them could speak.

Mulder stroked her hair, brushing a few sweaty strands away from her forehead. "I think I like your weekend idea better than mine."

"And the bed didn't even break. Yet."

"Yet?"

Scully smiled devilishly, leaning in to press a tender kiss to the tip of his nose. "You didn't think we were done, did you?"

His eyes widened but then he tugged at her hip, rolling her onto her side up against him before he grinned back at her. "Must be my lucky day then."

"Must be."

It hadn't started off as hers, but maybe his luck was rubbing off on her. Something stirring against her stomach certainly was.

This day couldn't possibly get any better, but she was sure as hell going to try.

* * *

 _Super squishy beta hugs to the wonderful Josie Lange for going through this so quickly and fixing all my dumb mistakes. I appreciate you so much, lady!_


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